For the first time, NOAA and partner scientists have connected the concentration of human-caused carbon dioxide in waters off the U.S. Pacific coast to the dissolving of shells of microscopic marine sea snails called pteropods.

“This is the first time we’ve been able to tease out the percentage of human-caused carbon dioxide from natural carbon dioxide along a large portion of the West Coast and link it directly to pteropod shell dissolution,” said Richard Feely, a NOAA senior scientist who led the research appearing in Estuarine, Coastal and Shelf Science. “Our research shows that humans are increasing the acidification of U.S. West Coast coastal waters, making it more difficult for marine species to build strong shells.”

The Alaska Ocean Acidification Network is hosting a 2-day workshop in Anchorage, inviting a broad audience across the state interested in ocean acidification issues. The aim of this workshop is to educate the broader Alaska community on the processes and consequences of OA, create connections between researchers and stakeholders, and develop new ideas and partnerships to enhance monitoring and community engagement. A report on the state of the science in Alaska will be produced after the workshop, as well as a set of recommendations to help guide the Alaska OA Network.

Day 1 will be conducted in plenary format and is intended to engage a broad audience including fishermen, shellfish growers, resource managers, researchers, coastal residents and anyone interested in ocean acidification. This first day will provide the basics on OA and an overview of research, monitoring, trends, forecasts and strategies for adaptation.  Day 2 will be more discussion-oriented and include breakout groups, a session for OA researchers, and a meeting of the Alaska OA Network steering committee.

NOAA's Ocean Acidification Program is planning a session for the ASLO 2017 Aquatic Sciences Meeting highlighting the transfer of ocean acidification knowledge from scientists to stakeholders. Registration and abstract submission are open for ASLO's 2017 Aquatic Sciences Meeting that will take place 26 February through 3 March 2017 in Honolulu, Hawaii, USA.  In order to have your abstract considered for acceptance, you must submit and register before the abstract deadline of Midnight, Central Daylight Time USA / 05:00 Greenwich Mean Time, on 14 October 2016. The abstract submission deadline will not be extended.  To begin the submission process, please go to https://www.sgmeet.com/aslo/honolulu2017/reginfo.asp to register.

46 Scientists from the region gathered again in Phuket, Thailand, 29－31 August 2016, stepping up their efforts to develop a long term program monitoring the ecological impacts of ocean acidification on coral reef ecosystems for the region.

The three-day WESTPAC event is a follow-up to previous two workshops in 2015, with the aim to review and test, through expert discussions and practical demonstrations either in field or laboratory, a set of consistent, comparable and cost-effective “Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs)”, which could be used for monitoring the ecological impacts of ocean acidification on coral reef ecosystems. While these efforts are focused on the establishment of a regional ocean acidification observing network, we are ideally striving for consistency and comparability as part of the Global Ocean Acidification - Observing Network (GOA-ON).

The NOAA Coral Reef Conservation Grant Program, 16 USC §§ 6401-6409, provides matching grants of financial assistance through the Domestic Coral Reef Conservation Grant program to institutions of higher education, non-profit organizations, for-profit organizations, and local (as defined at 2 CFR § 200.64, which includes counties, municipalities, and cities) and Indian tribal government agencies. These awards are intended to support coral reef conservation projects in shallow water coral reef ecosystems, including reefs at mesophotic depths, in American Samoa, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, Florida, Guam, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and coral-dominated banks in the U.S. portions of the Gulf of Mexico. Projects may be proposed in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands and the U.S. Pacific Remote Island Areas, but these locations are not considered geographic priorities under this announcement. Proposals submitted to this competition must address at least one of the following four categories: 1) Fishing Impacts; 2) Land-Based Sources of Pollution; 3) Climate Change; and 4) Local and Emerging Management Issues. Each category is described in more detail in the Federal Funding Opportunity announcement. All proposed work must be consistent with Coral Reef Conservation Program (CRCP) National Goals and Objectives 2010-2015. 

Interested applicants may obtain the full Federal Funding Opportunity announcement by visiting www.grants.gov, clicking on the “Search Grants, tab” and searching by funding opportunity number (NOAA-NOS-OCM-2017-2005011) or by CFDA number (11.482).